Photo illustration by S.P. Sullivan, MassLive.comSubmit your letters to The Republican at letters@repub.com. All letters must include the writer's name, address and telephone number or e-mail address, and are subject to editing.

America needs single payer health

A recent letter to the editor (“Obama’s health bill like other insurance,” The Republican) addressed how the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the Obama Health Care Act and (questioned) why should people be “forced” to buy any type of insurance.

I personally think the courts are doing biased politics. In no other country in the world do citizens have to depend on their jobs to provide them with health insurance.

And, it’s getting harder and harder to find jobs that offer adequate health insurance, or any at all.

We would be so much better off in this country with a single-payer system with no insurance companies making a profit and the poor being on Medicaid and the working poor getting inadequate coverage.

Everyone would have equal access to care, and the money that goes to pay for premiums could go directly to health care not insurance companies.

It would be so much less confusing than having hundreds of different health plans.

– MARJORIE DZIEWIT, Chicopee

Unilateral action won’t help Mideast

I’m writing because I am very concerned that the Palestinian resolution to unilaterally (without a negotiated peace with Israel) establish a Palestinian state will cause great hardship for both Israelis and Palestinians.

The Palestinians are not capable at this point of self-government. This declaration has high potential to set off a civil war between Hamas and Fatah. There is also a high likelihood, that this declaration and perhaps even the introduction of the proposal may stoke the coals of violence, which are ever present in Palestinian areas - resulting in violence, injury and death for both Israeli’s and Palestinians.

Further, a state declared in this manner, has virtually no chance of succeeding and its attempt is likely to set back more realistic attempts (those involving bilateral negotiations) indefinitely.

And finally, the Palestinian “right of return” is nonsensical. There is no reality, in which millions of Palestinians will be transplanted successfully to Israel; even its suggestion lacks fairness.

Israel, has for years, attempted to make peace with its neighbors. If there are any who actually care about the Palestinian people (I don’t even ask you to care for the Jews since it seems so difficult for the world), rather than using them as pawns to bash Israel, let them come forward with a reasonable proposal that holds the Palestinians to some kind of standards that will allow a real peace to evolve into maintainable statehood.

– ERIC GOLDSTEIN, Amherst

Postal Service acts unwisely

The U.S. Postal Service is having trouble and here is a good example of why: I mailed a package from Agawam at 9:25 a.m. (one recent day) to go about 65 miles to the northeast. I traced this package on my computer, and by (the next day) it had been processed in New Jersey.

The next time I had an update was (four days later), and it had been processed in Springfield; so, thus far, it went over 150 miles south to New Jersey and was now back about 65 miles from where its destination was and about three miles from where it started.

By the fifth day, according to the tracking, it was still in Springfield. When I asked about it at my local post office I was told that it would be in Worcester later that day and then to Rutland, its destination, the following day.

Somehow, it doesn’t make sense to me and is also a waste of time, money and manpower to send mail over 150 miles further from its destination only to be sent back to about three miles from where it started in order to get it the 65 miles to its destination.

Yes, I was being conservative on sending it standard mail instead of Priority Mail, but, I only did that because I was told that it was “expected” to arrive on the same day, three days after I mailed it.

The Postal Service isn’t being conservative when it uses services unwisely. And, they wonder why they are losing money.

I guess I will go to UPS from now on and know that packages will arrive through a better route and I will get my money’s worth.